


Silk

by armouredescort



Series: A Long Road to Courtship [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Gen, Hinted shallura, Injury, Long Hair
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-24
Updated: 2017-01-24
Packaged: 2018-09-19 13:43:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9443741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/armouredescort/pseuds/armouredescort
Summary: Shiro is injured in a mission and put into a healing pod. It has a glitch.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [80000_Bees](https://archiveofourown.org/users/80000_Bees/gifts).



The blow came fast and sharp, taking Shiro's helmet clean off his head. Before he could stop it, a second swipe threw him off his feet, smacking his head on the edge of a nearby cargo crate. He crumpled to the ground.

Somebody shouted. Footsteps boomed along the metal platforms of the Galra supply port, coming towards him.

A hand firmly pressed on Shiro's chest to keep him lying where he'd fallen. Someone tucked his helmet into his hands. Shiro wasn't sure if it was the same person who had yelled, and blinked in confusion at the blur of white and yellow and blue in front of him.

The world swayed. A smear of red in his vision. Shiro's eyesight sharpened - Lance, worried, glancing back at Shiro, and Hunk kneeling next to Shiro with a number of medical supplies laid out on a sheet. Lance was clutching his rifle, squeezing off shots to keep their enemies at bay.

"Hey, Shiro. You've gotta stay awake, okay?" Lance said. "You're our leader. We need you."

Shit, he sounded so scared. Shiro wanted to clap Lance on the shoulder and tell him everything was fine, but he was having trouble focusing on his mouth.

"Don't move," said Hunk.

He had a little scanner out, too blockish in shape to be of Altean origins. An orange laser swept over Shiro's body, taking in his data, and pinging softly. Hunk frowned.

"Head wound. Neck injury. Not good," he muttered.

Looking at his supplies, Hunk grabbed a vial and loaded it into a medical gun. It beeped as Hunk held it to Shiro's neck and pulled the trigger. The gun hissed, deploying its medication painlessly.

"That should keep the inflammation down and provide cells to stabilise the damage until we can get to a healing pod. In the meantime, don't move," said Hunk.

He took a circular pod from the pile and tossed it into the air. It glowed, generating a hard light hammock that seamlessly slipped under Shiro's back and lifted him without moving the neck.

"The mission," Shiro finally managed to say.

"Screw the mission, we're gunna get you back safely," Hunk snapped.

"Keith and Pidge are handling it," said Lance. "If they still need us by the time we've dropped you at the Castle of Lions, then we'll go help."

Shiro didn't want to leave the others without any backup. He also didn't have much of a say in the matter.

"Urgh, there's so much blood on his face," said Hunk.

The world was spinning again - was it the hammock or his head? Maybe both.

He must have passed out, because when Shiro blinked, the scenery changed to the healing pod room in the Castle, with six faces pressed up against it with expressions that Shiro could only describe as a mix of happiness, concern, and puzzled.

The healing pod's glass disappeared. Shiro felt his body flop toward, and he struggled to stay upright, falling into the group's arms.

"Welcome back," shouted Lance, just on the side of too enthusiastic for it to be considered normal behaviour.

The odd flavour of enthusiasm could have been chalked up to Lance being Lance, but the others were staring at him as well, as if they were waiting for Shiro to realise something.

"Thank you, but I'm right here. No need to broadcast to the next planet," said Shiro.

He balanced himself, rising from the group to stand without support. The others shifted their weight. Lance chuckled nervously, setting off Pidge's startled bark, which forced Keith and Hunk to turn away shyly. Allura seemed particularly quiet, standing at the back and glancing over at Coran in concern whenever she thought Shiro wasn't looking.

They weren't telling him something.

"Okay, cough it up. What went wrong in the pod?" asked Shiro.

"Nothing went wrong!" said Coran, bristling at the implication that the healing pods would malfunction under his command. "It worked, but you've got, ah, considerably more hair than before."

Shiro's hands went to his face. Nothing there. He was as clean shaven as he'd been going into their last mission. So what was Coran going on about?

"No, no, not there." Coran patted the back of his head to demonstrate.

Shiro slipped his hands around and immediately tangled his fingers into long, black and grey locks.

"So it did malfunction," said Shiro.

"It didn't malfunction! It glitched," insisted Coran.

Shiro swept his hair over his shoulder, realising it came to below his shoulderblades. Now that it was all in front of him, Shiro also noticed the thick band of white dropping from his temple. Otherwise, it seemed relatively healthy.

He frowned. It was absolutely going to get in the way.

"I can just cut it off," Shiro said. "Does anyone have sciss-"

The room burst into a chorus of disagreement, the group rushing him.

"Absolutely not," said Allura. "Long hair is a sign of prestige and honour in Altean culture."

"But Coran doesn't have long hair," said Shiro.

"In comparison to myself, no, however it is much longer than the Altean civilian's," said Allura.

Coran fluffed his hair with pride.

"Also it got caught one too many times in doors, so I trimmed it," said Coran. "But rest assured I had long locks in my youth."

Lance sidled up to Shiro, hands clasped together in a pleading manner.

"Let me plait it and you can decide later," said Lance.

It took only a few minutes of Lance staring with big, puppy dog eyes for Shiro to relent. He'd have to watch out for that - having Pidge walk all over him when she made sad eyes was bad enough, give Lance that power as well and the whole team would fall apart.

Lance pulled the hair back, quickly fingercombing it into a neat bundle. It was turned into a long plait before even a minute had passed.

"Pidge! Ribbon!" Lance said, holding out his hand.

Pidge pulled a pink and purple ribbon from her pocket and slapped it into Lance's hand. Tying it off into a bow, Lance stepped back to admire his work. He high-fived Hunk in satisfaction, who'd come around to watch Lance work.

"Always so fast," said Hunk.

"Does it look professional?" asked Shiro.

"It's not Garrison regulation, but we don't have to worry about them anymore," said Lance. "I mean, we're going to have the court martialling of the century when we get home, but we won't tell them about the bow if you don't."

Shiro inspected the plait. It was the tidiest he'd ever seen his hair, and that included when he had most of it shaved upon entry to the Garrison.

"It's beautiful," muttered Allura.

She'd obviously thought she was being quiet, as she flushed when Shiro looked at her and made an excuse about being needed on the bridge.

Shiro patted Lance's shoulder.

"Thanks, buddy. Do you think you could teach me some tricks to keep it under control?" Shiro asked.

Lance beamed in delight, and dragged Shiro off to his room to share haircare tips with Pidge, Hunk, and Keith in tow. ("You need to style that mullet!")

Which was probably a good thing, given Lance's next style was Princess Leia buns, and Shiro didn't need to explain to the Alteans exactly why the Paladins were dying of laughter.


End file.
